I love all the precious time that I have to lavish on my family. That is probably the best thing I love about being a homemaker and the reason for this list of "my loves" to answer your question. It seems like so long ago that I didn't like my job and wished I could be anything else. The LORD has definitely "made this barren woman to keep house and to be the joyful mother of children" as His Word so aptly states in the Psalms. It is all His doing - I am living proof. With that in mind, here is my list of loves about homemaking:
I love getting up early in the morning and praying over everyone. It's just the best sitting with the LORD and leaning against Him in His Word.
"I rise before dawn.
I cry for help.
I hope in Your Word."
I love being available to my husband at all hours of the day. I am here for him and pray so much to be his crown and his help.
I love having lots of time with my kids all day. We are a very close family, and that is also just precious to me.
I love taking this simple house and making it a loving home. It's a gift of love that I give to my family daily with a prayer of peace and praise. Gabe told me the other day that he hopes we will never sell this house because of all the great memories that live here.
I love the title "homemaker". Being the keeper of our home and its guard is a constant learning and growing experience - especially as my family continues to grow - with a fervent prayer of "a gentle and quiet spirit which is precious in His sight."
I love smelling wonderful things cooking in my kitchen. It may be the simplest of ingredients cooking, but it makes for the most wonderful aroma wafting all through the house. Last night it was Mushroom Barley soup, crescent rolls with crab filling, and cinnamon rolls for dessert.
I love going outside to hang up my clothes, and then coming inside to make our bed and freshen up our room. Yesterday I took the bed apart and vacuumed underneath and all around. I love having time to do those extra things in my home. Time is surely underestimated and undervalued.
I love putting on praise music or classical music in the early morning and then working around the kitchen setting up the kids' school work and chore list for the day. I just got that done. It's great to pick out their cooking recipes for the day and try all kinds of new things. Today we will be trying for the first time a pesto pizza with a white sauce - Abbie will be making it. Gabe will make granola. It's so much fun to teach my children to cook each day.
I love doing something in my home that needs attention every day. I feel so good about attending to something new for the day rather than just all my usual chores. Yesterday it was vacuuming under my bed, today it will be washing all the small teapots in the living room above the fireplace.
I love having time to converse with friends and to encourage them in any way or to be encouraged by them. Sometimes I will drop an e-mail to a dear friend as I did yesterday. It's wonderful to have time for friends and family.
I love going food shopping. I keep a running list all week, including things I want to try for next week and the specials for that week, and then I get to finally shop for everything. It's just the best picking out quality, healthy ingredients at the best possible price I can find.
I love putting flowers in my house from outside in our yard. Yesterday Abbie did the honors and brought in a small bouquet of red roses for our kitchen table.
I love seeing my kids read a good book and tell me all about it.
I love seeing Abbie knit every day and have the time to leisurely do so. She just finished a hat and is making a matching scarf right now.
I love hearing my kids practice their musical instruments every day and having the time to go back and play again if they feel like it.
I love having the car only one day in the work week, because everyone looks forward to our one outing, plus we save so much on gas; and I get a lot done at home because I am there four other work days during a week.
I love writing a handwritten letter to a friend or to someone who is in need of a kind and encouraging word.
I love calling a friend from out of state and catching up with her on a leisurely Sunday afternoon.
I love talking with my husband over a cup of coffee early in the morning before anyone is up, and it's still dark outside.
I love talking with my kids over a hot breakfast before we start school.
I love a daily bath. It's such a time of prayer and thanksgiving.
I love teaching my kids - especially from the Word of God. We often have such stimulating, spiritual conversations from something we read together in the Bible, even after they're older and call home or write to me over e-mail.
I love Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. I love birthdays. I love my wedding anniversary. They're times to celebrate in my house, and we always have such a good time together as a family, whether it's just us or with family and friends.
I love a tight budget, because without it, I don't think we would have learned how to cook all these delicious recipes from such simple ingredients over the years if we didn't have to learn. I can appreciate a tight budget these many years later, especially now with Brady writing to me from Spain about a great recipe he made and how he is stretching his money by cooking from scratch.
I love being completely debt free (even our mortgage) and seeing my husband released from this bondage after seventeen years of working hard and sacrificing to get free. It was worth all the work to see him so blessed and free. And it's so good to see my children as hard workers, givers, and good savers as they practice with us.
I love starting a fire each day when it's cold in the winter and keeping it burning for when my husband comes home so that we can eat together by the fire as a family.
I love putting candles on in the winter with soft music playing when my kids get up.
I love making a new recipe or two each week and seeing how it will turn out.
I love reading the Sunday paper leisurely with my whole family. Each one of us has his or her favorite section.
I love watching an old black and white movie with my family and lots of popcorn and hot, spicy tea or apple cider.
I love Mondays because that is the day I wash all the towels and bless my house with a good cleaning.
I love Tuesdays because that is the day we have the car to go help clean the church before dawn, and after we go food shopping early in the morning before the stores are crowded and when the meat is marked down, and later to the library and post office. It's a blast.
I love Wednesdays because my kids go to their youth groups (and they clean their rooms on Wednesdays before going out), and I teach a women's Bible study with three friends while my husband and children are at church. It's also linens day! The day I wash our sheets and tablecloths.
I love Thursdays because my husband gets paid, so I pay any bills on that day and put away any savings, and I also divide into cash the rest of our budget.
I love Fridays because it is the last day of school for the week, and we usually have something fun planned that evening.
I really love my work week.
I love all the seasons, too.
I love the summer for peach picking, swimming, barbecuing, fresh veggies from the garden, the first fresh tomato, being off school all summer, the beach, July 4th, and a leisurely vacation with my husband and kids.
I love the fall and seeing all the gorgeous leaves, the start up of school again and all the great books ahead of us, apple picking, a chill in the air, a cup of cocoa,Thanksgiving, and the first fire in the fireplace.
I love the winter and all the baking that warms up our house with soups and stews on the stove and a bread in the oven, candles glowing, lime and orange picking, Christmas, and tea time with a game of Racko or Scrabble and a warm cookie in front of a fire in the fireplace.
I love the spring with the flowers coming up, my kids planting the garden with my husband, my house getting warmer and the windows opening with the fragrance of orange blossoms in the air, Easter, baby vegetable picking, and school coming to an end for the year.
I love having people over and helping them to feel loved and "at home" with us. This morning at 4:15 a.m. one of those special people God has brought to our table many times called from Hungary and told us that we were his family away from home. I am so very glad.
I love learning new things. I love reading books that help me learn new things. I am always taking notes on all the new things which I am learning. Lately, it has been more herbology and frugality with a touch of ancient Italian cooking thrown in. I have three books that I'm reading presently. I just love to read. Especially before I fall asleep at night.
I love walking at His Pace, in His Peace, by His Power, for His Praise totally in His Presence doing His Priorities. I just love it and pray and pray that this might be so each day. It's a wonderful way to walk through a day. A bit of Heaven on earth.
I love being a help for His Honor.
I love the weekends. There is nothing like a good weekend, is there! It just makes for a great upcoming week after a really good weekend.
I love going to church. I always pray that I will be such a help there and to learn what He has for me that week. I love seeing my children and my husband connect with the family of God there.
I love running water, electricity, and even hot water in my home. I have lived without, and I am so thankful for all three! And for my wonderful tub and indoor bathroom. Wonderful!
I love hearing my kids' exclamations and memories as they pour over our photo albums.
I love taking a praise break and just praising God and thanking Him for His many blessings.
I love writing out our budget each quarter so that we might use our money wisely for His glory.
I love going on a date with my husband - even if it's just for a bagel and coffee- we always have a good time.
I love tiding the house before my husband comes home so that he will walk in and feel at rest, especially with something special for him on the stove.
I love deciding what kind of bread I will cook each morning. I never tire of the smell of bread wafting in the air in my kitchen.
I love praying. I pray all day.
I love worshiping the LORD. Especially while I work.
I love encouraging others. So when a friend called about her daughter in a very difficult situation, I wrote to her daughter to encourage her. I wrote her again this week.
I love it when my kids bring in the mail. We usually read it over tea as it comes in the afternoon.
I love homeschooling my children. I can't believe it is our 16th year. It's gone by too fast.
I love sitting around with my children's friends and chatting with them when they come over. They're so fun to talk to and to listen to as well.
I love going shopping with my kids, then out for a treat afterwards when we are off school. Abbie took me for a croissant and a cup of coffee this past Tuesday morning. It was so very nice.
I love to wear the scent of lavender and have my husband hug me and call me "his lavender Laine."
I love to hear my husband say how much he loves to come home.
I love tea time, and Abbie just called me to it with a lovely, chocolate angel food cake in her hands to our table by the fireplace. I better go!
Love,
Laine